15 November 2017

Scattershots – 15nov17 (update 18nov17)

George Rebane

Whistling past the jobs graveyard.Here is an example of highly paid people who don’t know what they are talking about as they attempt to convince us that AI will create more jobs for humans than the number it will destroy. An inane example assures us that “In retailing, store jobs lost to e-commerce have been replaced by jobs in fulfillment centers." No they haven’t; the fulfillment center jobs don’t come close to matching the brick-and-mortar jobs lost. The hoaksters also come up with some new jobs such as “genetic diversity officer”, “virtual store sherpa”, and “personal memory curator”. Right. And even if these materialized in sufficient numbers, how long before they too are snuffed by smart machines? To sum things up, these pinheads reach way down where the sun don’t shine and pull out some brown numbers such as, “… about 19 million positions in the U.S. will be automated out of existence in the next 15 years, while employers create some 21 million new roles.” You literally can’t make this stuff up.

Now for some real job news that tells you what kind of jobs are really out there now, and that our educational system doesn’t supply enough workers able to do the work. Take a look at what is happening in New London/Groton area where Electric Boat is building the Navy’s new submarines. The company says “it can’t locate enough qualified employees as higher military spending boosts orders”. Putting this into context in proto-socialist Connecticut, we read, “The defense industry is one of the few bright spots in Connecticut’s still-sluggish economy, which hasn’t fully recovered all the jobs it lost during the recession. Connecticut’s unemployment rate is 4.6%, down from a peak of 9.2% in February 2011, though above the national figure of 4.1% last month.” Whouda thunk that such a progressive state would have such a hard time climbing out of the Great Recession? (more here)

Finally, in this vein we are heartened to know that AI will now become a bona fide religion in which a super-intelligent godhead is conceived by its worshippers. This new god will no doubt give comfort to its believers who are jobless in ways we have yet to imagine. And it’s all happening – wait for it – yes, in the Bay Area (where else?). Now all of you think that I’m just putting you on to end this series of items with a little humor – au contraire mon ami! Get a snootful of what a correspondent just sent me – ‘Ex-Google Executive Registers First Church of AI with IRS’.

[18nov17 update] ‘Political parties serve and important, powerful purpose’ is the title of former supervisor and RR reader Todd Juvinall’s op-ed piece in the 18nov17 Union. In his commentary Mr Juvinall highlights the powerful argument for why likeminded people join in political parties, and what happens when one party or the other becomes dominant. In the old days we had parties seeking compromise as each realized that in the future the pendulum would swing the other way. Today that is a bygone as demonstrated in Sacramento and Washington. The only remaining alternatives are to steamroll, be steamrolled, or obstruct to achieve legislative stasis. Juvinall posits the Great Divide question for a number of contentious Right/Left issues. The commentary’s comment stream should be interesting reading.

‘Top general says he would resist “illegal” nuke order from Trump’ is one of the breathless headlines now making the rounds of the lamestream. The statement was made at an international security conference by Gen John Hyten, commander of STRATCOM, and in charge of passing the president’s order down to lower commands that would actually launch/deliver the weapons. There is nothing new in this statement by any US military officer. What’s news is the news media’s ignorance of how the US military works. As I’ve explained before in these pages, it is the responsibility of every commissioned officer to determine the legality of the orders he receives from his superiors, and carry them out only when he determines that they are legal. But more importantly, to refuse their execution if the officer believes the order to be illegal. Every since the Nurnberg war criminal trials in 1946, the defense of ‘I was just following orders.’ is no longer valid. In the American military every officer puts his ass on the line when ordered to kill. It’s his responsibility and duty to determine the legality of all orders before he executes them. Gen Hyten was just relaying what has been SOP for over 60 years, and the media were exposing their butt stupidity as usual.

Comments

Too ridiculous, but I guess it's something we've all gotta learn. I know people who say they movied here from the Bay Area to get away from all the homeless on the streets, or because renting a house, or apartment was too expensive. Well, I thought their Bay Area rentals were expensive years ago when they were buying land that was cheaper to build houses here to sell at a profit. They also thought that those in the Timber industry and other local enterprises were disgusting cuz we were doing it for monetary gain. I love people, but sometimes ignorant basic human nature gets on my nerves.

A score of 1 is given to societies with the highest inequality. US Scored .81, highest in the world, closest was Sweden at .79

On Monday, a global report from Credit Suisse showed that modern humans are continuing the trends set by our predecessors: Now, the report showed, half of the world’s wealth really does belong to a super-rich one percent, and the gap is only growing. Historically, Kohler says in his statement, there’s only so much inequality a society can sustain before it reaches a tipping point. Among the many known effects of inequality on a society are social unrest, a decrease in health, increased violence, and decreased solidarity. Unfortunately, Kohler points out, humans have never been especially good at decreasing inequality peacefully — historically, the only effective methods for doing so are plague, massive warfare, or revolution.

One of the main triggers for revolution has been long-term droughts resulting in the starvation of the underclasses. We are on the cusp of some long-term drought as the sun enters an extended quiet phase.

re Russ's post - The lefties might want to note that the states with largest disparity in wealth are run by the Dems. California is probably the worst. During the 30s while the nation was mired in depression there were more millionaires created than in the roaring twenties.
Lucky Strike Extra - after what violent revolution were the people materially better off than before? France? Russia? Venezuela? Cuba? There's only one.
I have pointed this out before, but it bears repeating - The average Joe (or Jodette) doesn't care how wealthy anyone else is as long as they feel they are doing all right and have a decent shot at bettering themselves. As the world wide economy continues to move wealth and jobs to the most efficient places and AI continues to displace old job skills, there will be more and more hopeless cases wondering what the heck just happened. The politicians will lie to them and point to anyone they don't like who has money. "They have your money - let's get em'!" As it happens always - the upper middle class, not the wealthy, will be destroyed. And the proles won't get a dime.
That's called history, folks.
Learn from it or repeat it.